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A merry heart does good, like medicine, But a broken spirit dries the bones. - Proverbs 17:22

Friday, January 7, 2011

Forgiveness

To Forgive Means to Forget.

I'll say it again, to FORGIVE means to FORGET.

How many times have we told the person who did us wrong, "I'll forgive you but I'll never forget it."

Think about what that means. You're saying:

If you hurt me again, I'm going to bring back the topic of this past hurt (which opens the floodgates which caused the argument in the first place).

If you hurt me again, I'm going to break up with you or threaten to break up with you because of this past hurt.

If you hurt me again, I'm going to hurt you because I'm reminded of the past hurt.

When we forgive, we need to let go. We need to let go of the memory, we need to let go of the past.
We need to move forward. You can't move forward when you're looking toward the past.

It's a cycle that keeps repeating itself. When will you decide to end the cycle? Today? Tomorrow? 40 years from now? On your deathbed?!?

If you need help trying to let go, take this advice I learned from a book by Tony Robbins.

Visualize the event (or whatever situation/person hurt you).
Visualize it as a still movie.
Enlarge the picture.
Now minimize the picture.
Visualize the image getting smaller.
Visualize the image losing color.
Attach feelings to it, view the image in its miniscule proportion. View it as harmless.

Play around with the image, make it large, make it small but always end by minimizing it's emotional attachment and significance to you.

According to NIMH (National Institute of Mental Health) 14.8 million American adults 18 and older suffer from depression. If you or someone you know is suffering from depression please visit http://www.stresscenter.com/ for help.